Illogical
by Jamalyn
Summary: Ken contemplates the meaning behind his own wants and desires, all the while losing touch with the one person who might just have the power to save him from himself. Daiken/Kensuke yaoi-ish


Author's Note: Umm, okay. So this was written years (and I really do mean _YEARS_) ago and I only realized whilst goofing off tonight that I never posted it to . I don't really know why not, or if there was a particular reason that I did not, but a quick re-read told me it was innocuous enough. So…yeah… I'm posting it. Enjoy!

**Illogical**

A kensuke of sorts.

I don't understand the deep-set fatigue that seems to have settled onto my life. It makes no sense; I'm not sleeping less, not doing more, and yet I'm continually plagued, pushed by my brain to just stop. Sit. Rest. The end of each step the beginning of the fight to take the next.

History. It's the only thing that keeps me moving forward rather than slipping to my knees in the middle of the sidewalk for a momentary reprieve, simple history and pure stubborn will. Not being willing to stop has worked in the past and so logic says that it will work today as well.

If I loose my logic I will have nothing left.

Somehow that almost seems right.

~~*~~*~~

The need to conform has always laid upon me a kind of forced asexuality. Ichijouji Ken, smart, respected, respectful, honored, honorable. My community given pseudonyms seemed to forego any association with honest human emotions. To have one is to lose the other.

Somehow I always knew it was a choice, perhaps even told myself that it was my choice to make.

I suppose then that I only have myself to blame for the wrong choice, if that's even what it was.

Before I was sure that I was living a lie, but now… Now I'm not sure that that lie wasn't truth, cleverly disguised, testing for my truest nature.

I don't even remember when the idea first crossed my mind. I was young, younger than I want to admit, even to myself. But logic saved me.

Logic, for years my truest friend.

University. Finally, it seemed, I might finally have the chance to study the idea. If I came to understand why, understand what it was that I wanted, then perhaps I could understand how to banish it.

Logic.

But it's difficult to face a foe you can't even look in the eye, especially when your roommate might return at any given moment and catch you, know you, parade before the world the real you.

Logic clearly states that the risks far outweigh the benefits.

Eventually, though, roommates give way to single rooms, the only connection with another danger—the bathroom shared with the adjoining suite. The bathroom with the lockable door.

The computer is muted, though damned if I know why. It's not as if these websites, dark and difficult to read as they are, come accompanied with any sounds, much less the boom-shaka-laka-boom my mind tries to insist is there.

But logic tells us that precautions are necessary.

Tokyo, BDSM. Such a simple search lands a mere 82,100 results and a quick scan of the first page leads me to believe that I should be watching much more anime, as therein lay my answers.

Such an idea is impractical, more proof that I shouldn't be here, that I'm walking willingly, eyes open, into a trap.

Logic predicts its own demise, stating that anything, pushed far enough, becomes its own foil, that the logic itself will become illogical.

The club's website was clean, bright, not unlike the one I'd pulled up the day before to get directions to the bookstore.

Except that rather than the newest bestseller, they offered freedom.

I wondered briefly if they employed the same webmaster. It all seemed so logical.

~~*~~*~~

The club itself was not nearly as well lit as its website.

Of course, logic reminded, there is no such thing as freedom in the light.

I was surprised to find that my logic was still with me. I rather imagined that logic could not exist in a place so dark, or so full. Or perhaps that had been a hope. I wasn't sure.

I suppose I stuck out, my pressed pants, the white dress shirt, the tie I never left the house without, not even when I was going to spend the night working, alone, in the lab. But that was all I had, as one did _not_ walk up to a store clerk and casually ask to be fitted for spandex and leather.

It's not as if I planed to participate. No. I was observing, much as I would any other chemical or, more appropriately, biological reaction. Take notes, make conjecture, test, question and retest.

The scientific method had sustained me in the past; logic stated that it would again.

I chose a table, small, in the back of the room. It was more of a booth really, not made of one solid piece but rather a table surrounded by high backed benches. I thought that I was hidden, that for once my hair, my quiet nature might shield me from sight rather than draw people nearer.

~~*~~*~~

It was my fifth time there. I had almost gotten used to the place, the heavy music, the way nobody seemed to have heard that smoking was bad for your health.

He surprised me, completely. I thought that I slipped under the radar, that nobody but the waitress ever noticed me.

After all, this was my fifth time here.

I held my short glass tight, not willing to trust his easy smile, wondering what it was he wanted of me, if he knew me.

"Who are you hiding from?"

I didn't want to look at him, didn't want to give him more of a chance to see my face. I just wanted to get away. I did not realize how intensely I was frowning until he spoke again.

"Temperamental, aren't you." He reached out, planning, it seemed, to brush away the hair I was using to protect myself. I pushed myself back as far as possible into the corner of the padded bench, out of his reach, or so I hoped.

His smile faltered slightly at my exaggerated flinch before returning to its previous strength. "Okay," he agreed easily, although I was not exactly sure as to what. I expected him to get up and leave. Logic suggested such was the only possibility. Unfortunately, not all are so acutely aware of the inevitability of logic.

He stayed, sitting sideways on the bench with his knees pulled up under his chin as he watched the crowd with me.

"What's your name?" I was shocked to hear my own voice. I had never even thought such a question. But he didn't seem to mind, turning his head to smile at me a moment before focusing his attention back on the dance floor.

"Daisuke."

I could never return. Simple logic told me to never return.

~~*~~*~~

He was already there, waiting for me to arrive, expecting me. Briefly, I considered sitting somewhere else; somewhere he would not be able to see me. It didn't even occur to me to leave.

I suppose leaving would be illogical by this point. That's what I wanted to believe anyway.

He smiles as I slide into my side of our booth. "I thought you might leave."

The simple phrase bothers me somehow. "You were watching me?"

"Always."

I push deeper into the shadows of the corner. I don't even know how many times I've come here now; I don't want to know.

"Don't say things like that." But it's been too long. He sends another smile in my direction.

"You're in a bad mood tonight."

I shrug. I don't suppose my mood really matters all that much.

"That's okay," he assures me anyway. A hand lifts momentarily from where it lay, wrapped around his knees before quickly resettling itself. He has not tried to touch me since that first night.

We don't speak again until I wave at the waitress to order my third drink.

"Don't."

I frown in his direction. He is not looking at me, but somehow picks up on my unspoken question anyway.

"I need you to take me home tonight," he explains, never so much as glancing in my direction, "I don't ride with drunks."

No, logic insists, no, no, no, no.

"Why?" my mouth asks. He doesn't answer.

~~*~~*~~

I always take him home. Always. I don't know how he gets to the club and I don't ask. I don't know if he is ever there when I'm not.

I won't ask.

I don't want to know. I can't.

The first time I took him home, he invited me in. I told him no.

I am an observer. I accept that there is nothing I can study without changing. Logic tells me that.

I know that somehow I have altered this man's natural terrain, that he is adapting differently then he would if I were not here.

I wonder if I am harming him, causing some sort of distorted variation from his would-be norm. But I cannot prove my own detrimental effects and am willing to accept this lack of proof as proof.

Illogical.

The word burns my mind momentarily.

~~*~~*~~

It seems strange, my waiting on him, my watching for him. He should be here. Creatures of logic do not change their patterns of living so readily.

I never realized how waiting, wondering pulls so on the soul, drags a person down, wears them out.

I want to leave, to go home and lie in my bed, even if I cannot sleep and am destined to spend the rest of the night staring at the wall.

But logic tells me that I cannot leave, that Daisuke might still arrive.

I almost worried the first time he didn't show. It seemed so strange, as if he had always been sitting there, waiting for me. I wondered if perhaps he wasn't ill, a winter's cold that kept him in bed. There was no way that he would come if he were sick.

And logic insists that he will return.

But eventually that theory could no longer be believed, trusted and so had to be revised. The problem, however, arose in the revision.

I was shocked to discover that I wanted an explanation, his explanation, going so far as to actually drive to his apartment late one night.

But I didn't go up. It was late and I had had too much to drink. He always frowned when I had more than two drinks. I wondered briefly if I should be driving before restarting the car and heading back to my own apartment.

I wondered if he was watching.

It is logic that tells me ignoring my wants, my wishes is the only way to guarantee that they will come true.

I half expected to see him the next weekend, going so far as to actually tell a questioning woman that I was waiting on someone, but I did not. Again, the thought of leaving for his place crossed my mind, but somehow, without the extra alcohol, the idea seemed even more preposterous.

It's not as if we were friends, or even acquaintances. He was a man I studied in a bar. I was observing migratory behavior, little more. Migration; a condition that suggests a repetitive behavioral pattern.

I should be able to predict any such pattern, discover its inner logic like any other given fractal. Discover the code that allows for interpretation of the whole.

It was logic that insisted that it was only in _not_ finding him that he could be found.

Damned illogical, or perhaps, just damned.

If I lose my logic I will have nothing left.

And somehow, that almost seems right.


End file.
